Hans Purrmann - The Vitality Of Colour -

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Résumé :
Already during his lifetime, Hans Purrmann (1880-1966), who combined French modernism with German tradition, was appreciated by fellow artists and cultural personalities as a "great colourist". In fact, as a painter and cross-border networker with life stations in Munich, Berlin, Paris, Florence and Switzerland, he was an important artist for the development of classical modernism. In the circle of the French bohemia, he is "massier" (foreman) of the Académie Matisse. He becomes a major pupil and finds his very own way, characterized by colour intensity and equilibrium. In Germany, he was the "Frenchy", in France, "L'allemand". When the National Socialists banned him as "degenerate", he chose the Villa Romana in Florence as his place of refuge . in 1943, he fled to Montagnola in Switzerland. Throughout his life, he cultivated a lively exchange with personalities of the European cultural scene from Henri Matisse to Hermann Hesse. He was married to the artist Mathilde Vollmoeller-Purrmann. With him and many young artists from Scandinavia and all over the world, she had studied at the private Académie of Matisse and extended his influence in modernism.